The most wonderful time of the year is here. This year, however, Christmas is sadly overshadowed by the ongoing assault and targeting of civilians in Palestine and Gaza where an ongoing war on Hamas, the political grouping that controls the Gaza Strip by Israeli forces has led to the death of more than 20,000 civilians.
The war has been described as a genocide because of the indiscriminate killing of civilians in the name of tackling a terror network, the deliberate targeting of journalists especially those who have been highlighting the war crimes taking place as well as those highlighting the dire humanitarian situation that the people of the enclave have been subjected to by the dominant force who have denied the residents of the enclave the right to live in dignity.
It is no surprise then, that in the city of Bethlehem which falls in the West Bank part of Palestine the celebration of Christmas in the land of Jesus’ birth is very subdued. The Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem and the Church, in general, have expressed solidarity with the people of Palestine and will be observing a very sombre festival minus all the festivities and tourists that usually throng the historic city at this time of the year.
Amidst all the carnage and the war, Christmas has found a renewed meaning in the land of Jesus’ birth. Much like at the time of Jesus' birth, his family was forced to travel to Bethlehem in obedience to a royal edict to conduct a census, his mother was forced to find space within a cowshed and give birth in a manger -- a feed trough for the cattle -- and almost soon enough was forced to flee and become a refugee to Egypt in the wake of slaughter of innocents thanks to a tyrannical edict to kill all male children below the age of two.
It is almost as if two thousand years since Jesus’ birth, not much seems to have changed for the powers that be and the persecution they inflict upon the people in whose name they claim to be ruling. As said by Munther Issac, the pastor of the Lutheran Church in Bethlehem: “If Jesus were to be born today, he would be born under the rubble.”
Despite the obvious suffering, calls for a ceasefire have fallen on deaf ears with the United States even using its veto power to negate a United Nations resolution calling for a ceasefire despite the resolution being worded in a balanced way that avoided references to the historical claims of the land and instead focussing on the need to alleviate the immediate humanitarian suffering.
This Christmas needs to be an opportunity for the world powers to use their “power” and ensure peace prevails, that Israel stops targeting humanitarian facilities like hospitals and especially places where it has asked civilians to flee and the deliberate targeting of journalists and their families.
It cannot be that there is one set of rules for Israel and another set of rules for the rest of the world. Let this Christmas be an opportunity to allow and build on a lasting ceasefire and peace in the land revered by the world’s major religion as Holy. It is what Jesus would have wanted.
